Dewar

Apologies for my meandering conversation. These things are in my mind a lot as I really love most of Bioware's work (especially Mass Effect, regardless of how it ended) but I don't often have the opportunity to put them on paper. That article I guess gets to the crux of my problem with the game fairly well, with a little bit of my own sexual uncomfortableness mixed in. Also, this PA comic, for a bit more crude commentary: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2014/12/03

Wow, quick on the draw here, I just watched the episode yesterday myself. Personally, it seemed to me that Albert was questioning the phenomenon out of skepticism and that Truman was asking out of interest and fascination. The way that scene comes across to me, both the first and second time watching, is that Albert is a little weasel who gets beaten up a lot and made up this story (or maybe even believes it a little) to avoid getting punched again. I didn't think it made him sympathetic at all, I actually think it made him seem even less so.

Hmm, I found most of the characters in ME3 to be pretty undesirable I guess. Kaidan is indeed bisexual, but I agree he wasn't much of a catch. I guess I would prefer a fairly equal mix of bisexual, sexually preferenced (unisexual I guess,) and completely uninterested characters. I like the idea of attempting to pursue a character, like flat out having romance options on the chat wheel, but it not working out because the character isn't interested for whatever reason. At the moment, you can generally be assured that if a romance option appears, that you'll be able to drive it to conclusion, which just feels icky to me, like the characters in the game don't really have a choice, which is really a hilarious concept I guess. I guess the bi-sexual thing is really just an extension of that where it feels like my choices as the player are overriding the character's natural sexual preferences.

Ah, well that's good at least. i guess I should play more DA:I then. I was basing most of my comment on DA:O and Mass Effect.

The more I'm listening to game of the year discussions, the more I'm thinking that Titanfall might be my game of the year. As much as I loved Shadow of Mordor, it was a bit of a fleeting experience where I played the crap out of Titanfall for 2 or 3 months.

The only other thing I can think of is that your scanner is broken/de-powered/lousy? Usually signal sources are a few ships or a few containers floating in space, so I suppose it would be possible to jump in and not have things close enough to detect?

Personally, my problems with sexuality in Bioware games has more to do with the number of bi-sexual characters with a very laissez faire attitude toward their own preferences. Not because I have anything against bi-sexual folks, but because it feels like Bioware is so obsessed with letting you sleep with whomever you want that you can ply just about any character either way. It feels like you're losing some character depth for the sake of player aggrandizement. I guess, by the same token, it would be nice to have more folks on the team that just weren't interested. Still I recognize that they're making strides that hopefully others will follow, and that representations will hopefully improve as time goes on. Heck it might be better in DA:I, but the Kunari woman I'm playing doesn't have time for that romance nonsense so I haven't explored it that deeply as of yet.

The Bioshock point I was trying to make is that

I have never had that happen. Are you sure you're completely locked on with the "Safe to Disengage" message at the middle of your HUD? If you disengage near a target but don't have the safe disengage prompt, then you're not technically in the same instance.

*fart* Steam play times are never right.

So, I think I'm going to take a break for a while. I've been having a lot of fun, but I also blew an entire day of my vacation doing nothing but playing this, topped off with a pretty crappy mission experience. Apparently, a daily downtime was instituted during the Christmas break to stave off some server instability before the devs can come back from vacation and start patching again. I don't have a problem with this, but it's not announced anywhere on the launcher or in game, only on the forums. Even then, it's not a thread in the news section, but instead a stickied thread in the discussion section. So, I ended up grabbing my very first kill 6 pirates mission, with a 3 hour time limit, less than a minute before the in-game notification that there's 30 minutes to shut down. This is already 10:30pm, try as I might I only manage to tag three of them before I have to dock. Fine, it's only a 15 minute downtime, so I wait 20 minutes, server still isn't up. I hop in the forums, no announcements. Then I read through the Christmas daily downtime thread to the end, and a few people are talking about how it's going to be an hour this time, instead of 15 minutes. I don't know where that information even came from, I still haven't seen an official announcement or anything. Fine, at this point that's only 30 more minutes, and then 30 minutes to kill 3 more pirates, and I can still be in bed at 12:30. Server comes up, I kill one more pirate, then enter in to an unknown contact who offers me the deal to kill two cops instead. This changes the mission to an either/or setup, but also clears the counter of kills I've already gotten. So now I have to kill 6 pirates all over again. None of this would have bothered me if it wasn't for the real time mission timer. I would have just gone to bed when the server first went down and finished it in the morning. Such a bizarre decision to include that.

I don't get it.

I beat Sailor's Dream,the new game by Simogo of Year Walk and Device 6 fame. I read some reviews ahead of time and was warned that it wasn't much of a game, more a story told in little bits. There aren't any puzzles and there really even any choices to make. I knew all that ahead of time and I was still somewhat disappointed. First, there just isn't much story there, for a game that's mostly story. It's told in a very interesting way divided between written passages, songs, and radio transmissions, but there's just not enough character development to really get involved. On top of that, about half the content is based around opening the app at specific times to hear specific messages, which quickly shifted from suspense-building to a chore. It's a shame too, because the production value of what content is there is really really good. meh/5

I guess it depends on where you are. I've been playing in Open mode and I've maybe seen 2 or 3 other pilots the entire time. My friend, on the other hand, was trying to dock and the base was completely full so he had to drop to solo mode eventually.

Yay, Norwegian candy! My wife actually has some Norwegian roots, so I'm gonna take this stuff along to the Christmas party. Thanks, mysterious Santa.

They provide a computer opponent in Smash Brothers that studies your play style and gets better at beating you. Edit: And hopefully other things in other games at some point, maybe.

Iron Bull is the best.

I think I finally figured out who sent the note that started Donna along this investigation path. During the phone call between Donna and the mysterious Meals on Wheels patron, she says "I recieved yours" which I assume is a reply to his (unhearable) statement of "I got your note."

At least you had it wrapped. i just stuffed items in a box and shipped it

Ash was such a weird pick.

I know what you mean. I got more fun out of it by sitting and hitting "Advance Time" until the nemesis chart was full again each time I started playing, but it's still a pretty easy game.

Reply to that Bioshock Spoiler

Generally insurance pays a good portion for mental maintenance.

The answer is Kirby.

And here I always thought that was a reference to the raw eggs in Rocky.